How does a comparable woman run? 18s? 19s? Or are woman now equal and gotta be a 16:20 too?
How does a comparable woman run? 18s? 19s? Or are woman now equal and gotta be a 16:20 too?
Not even close to a 16:20. I'd say mid 18 is about the equivalent.
Yep - about 18:30 is the women's equivalent
18:10
IAAF Scoring tables say the equivalent is actually 20:47 for women.
18:10-18:20
Please. A girl running mid 18s is getting money to run D1, while a boy running 16:20 is not getting a glance from D1.
A girl on my team ran 17:40 as a sophomore, but has gotten slower since and now runs about 18:00. She just got a full ride to University of Hawaii. I know the sport of cross country and track is much less competitive for girls.
Maybe because there's less girls running cross country than boys?
That Guy 56 wrote:
Please. A girl running mid 18s is getting money to run D1, while a boy running 16:20 is not getting a glance from D1.
Agreed. I think it's closer to 18:50. Maybe slower, but under 19:00 for sure.
Plot out the bell curve of men's performances, then delete 75% of them. That's how sparse​ women's competition is.
I don't think you agree. A guy running 16:20 is no where near as good as a girl running sub 19:00. He is like a girl running closer to 21:00. Decent, but not D1 level.
That Guy 56 wrote:
Please. A girl running mid 18s is getting money to run D1, while a boy running 16:20 is not getting a glance from D1.
Please what?
That Guy 56 wrote:
I don't think you agree. A guy running 16:20 is no where near as good as a girl running sub 19:00. He is like a girl running closer to 21:00. Decent, but not D1 level.
You're exaggerating... a HS boy running 16:20 at state places about the same as a girl running around 19. In college maybe high 18's. Definitely not 20+.
IMO multiplying by 10/9 or adding 45s per mile gives you the range:
10/9 * 16:20 = 18:09
16:20 + 3.1(45 seconds) = 18:39
So between 18:09 and 18:39 is the women's equivalent. Using 10/9 is more for elite athletes and 45 seconds is more for high school. I'd say 18:35-18:40 is equivalent.
Stupid, so a women who runs sub15 for 5K is better than 5k wr?
You cannot compare men and women's times linearly because the difference is closer to exponential than linear. One reason for this is because the top women have straighter bodies, i.e. bodies shaped more like men that give them a larger advantage over the rest of the women. The men have no such advantage.
That Guy 56 wrote:
IAAF Scoring tables say the equivalent is actually 20:47 for women.
This is accurate and why professionals do the equivalents and not keyboard coaches.
I looked up the top 5K times on the athletic.net D3 page. In 2016, the 623rd ranked male runner ran 16:20. The 623rd ranked female ran 20:36.
16:20 places about like a 19:40 for a girl at HS state meet.
The difference is top women's competition usually bury the field in HS. Top womens prep runners will be 2 minutes in front of 19:40. Top men will only be 60 seconds in front of 16:20.
There is more recruiting competition for women, and fewer women who have the ability to run successfully at the college level.
The men's 5k record is 12:37.35,
multiplying that by 10/9 gives the "equivalent" of a 14:01.5 women's 5k. The actual women's record is 14:11.15. Using the 45s/mile rule yes, you will get that a sub 15 5k is "equal" to the world record, but I specified that 45s is most accurate at the high school level and using 10/9 works better for elite athletes. I personally use 35-45 seconds/mile for high school but in my previous post I was looking at extremes.
Nothing as simple as multiplying by a conversion factor will be truly accurate. Additionally, a men's record and women's record are not necessarily "equal". But IMO it comes pretty close— that's why we call it a "rule of thumb", not a "precise formula".
I'm curious about the IAAF tables. For elite performances is one thing, but they seem off for slower times to me. Looking at HS outdoor 1600m times on athletic.net I found that a 4:59 1600 for a woman was "worth" about a 4:18/4:19 for a man. (4:18 by percent, 4:19 by number). IAAF tables say that a 4:59.90 for a woman is 914 points, or a 4:13.63 for men. So that's a bit closer.
It also depends if you are measuring by percent or number-- the top 100 women vs the top x% of women who run track, for example.
Men's records * 10/9 vs women's records:
800m-- 1:52.12, 1:53.28
1500m-- 3:48.89, 3:50.07
3k-- 8:09.63, 8:06.11
10k-- 29:12.81, 29:17.45
HM-- 1:04:52, 1:05:26
Marathon-- 2:17:43, 2:15.25 (mixed gender) or 2:17:42 (women only)
Clearly not perfect but it holds up reasonably well.